Mass effect 3

[Number Six]

I think much of the fan outrage over ME3 stems from comments made by the producers and execs at EA/BioWare before the release of the game. Casey Hudson told a massive whopping lie to the gaming media when he said the game would contain MANY different endings and be personalized to your save game based on the choices you've made throughout the previous games. In reality, all you got were three different choices. Doesn't matter what you did before that - you could be the most noble of paladin types or the biggest genocidal jerk in the galaxy, you still get those three choices.

That's lame.

But I could accept it if the development team hadn't touted features that weren't in the game. I'd still think it was a shoddy ending, but I'd accept it. What sticks in my craw is the fibbing they did to their customers. They took our money and gave us the reach-around. Not cool. It's not the first time a game developer has embellished their product via pre-release hype and it won't be the last, but after the watered down sequel to Dragon Age, the rather dubious day one DLC for ME3 and now the ending debacle, I won't be spending any of my precious cash on BioWare product again (which is sad, because I've been a fan since the Baldur's Gate days).

[alhoon]

But ME2 also had day one DLC. As others have said, that DLC was the incentive to buy the collector's edition. And then for those that didn't get the collectors or didn't preorder etc, they offered them the chance to buy that content.
As for the endings, I would agree.
Technically, Baatezu-like every choice played a part in the finale. How? The war assets. They never said it would be a big part did they? Talking to person X in the citadel? +5 war assets.
War assets can change the ending you get after all, right? Right!
Weeeeeeell, when I read every choice would play a part in the ending I have a different in mind than

VIEW CONTENT:

"Ever choice you made will play a role on whether the blue/red/green explosion would destroy 3 marines and the tower of london or just the tower of London or will leave even the tower of London standing!"

However, technically, every choice had a part in the finale.
Personally I would have prefered a cutscene at the end with a bit of all those you gathered under your banner besides the color of the explosions. 4-5 seconds for each one. Yes, it would be like 2 extra minutes. I think we wouldn't be bored with things like

VIEW CONTENT:

Turian soldiers saved by krogans led by Grunt, Quarrens assisted by Asari, Geth ships saving Destiny Anscension, those big red Geth shooting to let Jack with her students escape, Samara recuperating in a medic shuttle manned by volus, Jacob and Vega dying (unless you have also brought the Batarians on board) etc.

Sure those combinations would be like x3 for those two mins = 6 mins of computer graphics. I doupt that would have cost that much.

The said 16 different endings... well, it was more like 3 similar endings

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1. You defeat the reapers one way or the other and earth gets wasted
2. You defeat the reapers one way or the other and earth is just damaged
3. You defeat the reapers and you get Symbiosis

[Number Six]

The ME2 DLC was free though. And really it was just a cover to maximize profits from anyone who waited and bought the game second-hand. Ahh... EA. Businessmen first.

[Jester of the FoS]

The ME2 DLC was free though. And really it was just a cover to maximize profits from anyone who waited and bought the game second-hand. Ahh... EA. Businessmen first.

How is that different? In both cases, it's DLC to cover people coming in late.

They had the exact same thing in Dragon Age. They had the bonus content for people who ordered the Collector's Edition (an extra mission) but allowed people to buy it later if they just picked-up the regular edition.

ME2 also had two (TWO!) DLC only companions. Heck, all said and done I spent like $35 on DLC for ME2. But given the play time of said content, hour-for-hour it was cheaper than going to the movies.
It's no big deal. Just a reason to complain. Better than money for hats or horse armour.
I'm always willing to pay extra for more content in a game I like and to companies I like.

I'm happy with most of ME3. I've put 130 hours into the series (easily) and only dislike 5 minutes. And then I was only dissatisfied when I looked online. I'm happy with everything but 0.064%. Almost laughable.

AND the company plans to try and fix the problem. Cool. How many other companies would be that understanding? They've more than earned my trust and patience. They're also releasing it for free. Hundreds on man-hours of work by well-paid professionals. They could have charged. The fans would have happily paid. But it's free!

And these days, I accept that games are never really finished on release. Heck, ME2 wasn't finished until a 14 months, when they released the arrival DLC that led into ME3.
Nowadays I'm dissapointed when a game doesn't have DLC. I want more Skyrim right now.

[Number Six]

How is that different? In both cases, it's DLC to cover people coming in late.

Difference is, Zaeed is not an essential part of the series' lore like a Prothean is. Much as I liked Zaeed, he's just a guy with a gun who likes killing things. You can't even have proper conversations with him outside of select missions (a lame trick they used for ALL interactions with NPC's in ME3, sadly). Same goes for Shale in DA:O. Hardly essential to the main quest.

But a Prothean? An honest to goodness Prothean? We've been talking and speculating about those guys since Eden Prime back in the first ME. And he's all yours for an extra $10! Hee hee!

I'm going to sound like a grumpy old fart, but I don't care. I remember a time when games came out and if you wanted it, you paid for it... and you got a complete game. If it had bugs, you'd eventually get a patch, but overall your game was complete. There wasn't extra content buried on the discs in hidden code so the developers could give you the reach-around and charge you five or ten bucks to unlock new outfits or an extra NPC companion or some dopey, tacked on side quests. No. When and if the developers were good and ready, they'd release an expansion pack. Expansions were brimming with extra goodies to extend the life of your game. True, they could cost from upwards of $20, but it was so worth it for an extra 10, 20, 30+ hours of game time. You actually got bang for your buck.

Apologists will say DLC is how game companies make money nowadays... pirating is killing their business, second-hand selling of games is killing their business, blah blah blah. I understand the big companies like EA are trying to run businesses here. They aren't out to be our friends, they're trying to make money. But it REALLY gets under my skin when the empty suits running the show hatch up underhanded, insidious business practices (invasive DRM, online passes, Origin nonsense, buying out smaller studios and sacking anyone with an inkling of creativity while running said studio's marquee franchises into the ground, day one DLC, withholding games from Steam so they can have ultimate control over DLC, etc, etc) and then hide behind 'artistic integrity' when PAYING CUSTOMERS have the audacity to complain. It's a joke. Whatever happened to the customer is always right?

AND the company plans to try and fix the problem. Cool. How many other companies would be that understanding? They've more than earned my trust and patience. They're also releasing it for free. Hundreds on man-hours of work by well-paid professionals. They could have charged. The fans would have happily paid. But it's free!

No. They're not fixing the problems at all. The problem is, the ending is stupid. It violates canon established by their own writers in all three games. (See http://kotaku.com/5898743/mass-effect-3 ... ed-players for more). You could steer the Normandy through the plot holes and the nonsensical pretentious doggerel. EA is doing the least they could possibly do in this situation -- giving us more of the same, believing that because it's 'free', nobody will have a right to complain. Instead of changing the ending, instead of giving us multiple endings as they promised, they're going out of their way to further 'explain' their lame, tacked on ending to us. Patting the children on the head dismissively and then shooing them away. No wonder EA 'won' the worst company in America award.

[alhoon]

AND the company plans to try and fix the problem. Cool. How many other companies would be that understanding? They've more than earned my trust and patience. They're also releasing it for free. Hundreds on man-hours of work by well-paid professionals. They could have charged. The fans would have happily paid. But it's free!

While I have no problem with them, I would disagree on that.
- At first they said "That's how we wanted the ending, it won't change". Then as reviews turned to 2 stars in Amazon it changed to "We will take it in consideration" till the final "OK! We will add things and make changes to the ending. STOP GIVING US 2 IN AMAZON!"
-Personally I don't think it will be 100s of man hours of work.


Plot holes in the ending: I personally disagree with many of the "plotholes" people in the net consider as such. For spoilers, I won't mention them there.

[Jester of the FoS]

I'm going to sound like a grumpy old fart, but I don't care. I remember a time when games came out and if you wanted it, you paid for it... and you got a complete game. If it had bugs, you'd eventually get a patch, but overall your game was complete. There wasn't extra content buried on the discs in hidden code so the developers could give you the reach-around and charge you five or ten bucks to unlock new outfits or an extra NPC companion or some dopey, tacked on side quests. No. When and if the developers were good and ready, they'd release an expansion pack. Expansions were brimming with extra goodies to extend the life of your game. True, they could cost from upwards of $20, but it was so worth it for an extra 10, 20, 30+ hours of game time. You actually got bang for your buck.

Meh. Games change. Times change.

I remember when expansions were considered cash grabs, for not being full sequels. And I remember some hate aimed at BioWare back in the day for not really ending Baldur's Gate until the expansion. (1 or 2... I forget...) Ditto Blizzard for Diablo II.
Before that, I remembered when patches were rare and if something was broken in a game you just had to work around it. Especially when games were on cartridges or prior to ready access to the internet. I had games I physically could not continue playing because of glitches.

I always respect game designers and companies that release a working product day one instead of dumping a broken P.O.S. on the market knowing the can patch it into acceptability. I was playing ME3 on launch day without a single glitch or lengthy patching, and I loved that.

I'm much happier now knowing if a sub-level wasn't finished or a zone wasn't 100% game companies aren't forced to release something sub-par or delay, but can instead release that as content after. Look at Knights of the Old Republic 2, which has a terrible ending and huge plot problems and very little resolution at all, not just because they were expecting a third game, but because it was pushed out the door. I would have killed for some DLC fixing that mess.

Apologists will say DLC is how game companies make money nowadays... pirating is killing their business, second-hand selling of games is killing their business, blah blah blah. I understand the big companies like EA are trying to run businesses here. They aren't out to be our friends, they're trying to make money. But it REALLY gets under my skin when the empty suits running the show hatch up underhanded, insidious business practices (invasive DRM, online passes, Origin nonsense, buying out smaller studios and sacking anyone with an inkling of creativity while running said studio's marquee franchises into the ground, day one DLC, withholding games from Steam so they can have ultimate control over DLC, etc, etc) and then hide behind 'artistic integrity' when PAYING CUSTOMERS have the audacity to complain. It's a joke. Whatever happened to the customer is always right?

Well, EA are dicks and do mandate DLC for their games because of the higher profit margin. I dislike that. But I appreciate quality DLC opposed to cosmetic crap which most games settle on.

As for the "artistic integrity" bit, I respect that a whole heck of a lot more than other reasons for crappy endings: i.e. ran out of time and money. ME and BioWare is one of the few video game companies I'll accept "artistic integrity" as a line, because they really do seem to view it as an art. The work did have thematic overtones. It wasn't shallow mindless splat, so I'll accept a smarter more science fiction ending. And it was. The three options reverberated as sci-fi tropes and the series as a whole has been a love letter to speculative fiction of the past.

AND the company plans to try and fix the problem. Cool. How many other companies would be that understanding? They've more than earned my trust and patience. They're also releasing it for free. Hundreds on man-hours of work by well-paid professionals. They could have charged. The fans would have happily paid. But it's free!

No. They're not fixing the problems at all. The problem is, the ending is stupid. It violates canon established by their own writers in all three games. (See http://kotaku.com/5898743/mass-effect-3 ... ed-players for more). You could steer the Normandy through the plot holes and the nonsensical pretentious doggerel.

It's only the tiniest of canon derivations. It's something most people won't ever notice as it involves reading one of the Codex. And not even the primary codex with the speech, but the secondary written codex. And it's so easy to explain away the explosions not being that deadly through any amount of technobabble. It's no big deal, and is really splitting hairs to get more upset over the ending.

EA is doing the least they could possibly do in this situation -- giving us more of the same, believing that because it's 'free', nobody will have a right to complain. Instead of changing the ending, instead of giving us multiple endings as they promised, they're going out of their way to further 'explain' their lame, tacked on ending to us. Patting the children on the head dismissively and then shooing them away. No wonder EA 'won' the worst company in America award.

It's not EA. EA has nothing to do with it. At all.
EA is just the owner publisher. They sign the cheques and collect the extra profits and are the boss' boss to the folk at BioWare, who are the people involved in the ending. They're really the only ones involved, and as long as they keep making money and following the guidelines handed down by EA (such as DLC and official sequels as they sell, which was the problem with DragonAge 2) then BioWare can manage themselves.

[Jester of the FoS]

AND the company plans to try and fix the problem. Cool. How many other companies would be that understanding? They've more than earned my trust and patience. They're also releasing it for free. Hundreds on man-hours of work by well-paid professionals. They could have charged. The fans would have happily paid. But it's free!

While I have no problem with them, I would disagree on that.
- At first they said "That's how we wanted the ending, it won't change".

Which is fair as it wasn't a mega-happy sunshine ending. People were bound to be upset it wasn't what they wanted. There is always going to be a percentage of malcontents unhappy with what you produce. It's a fair first reaction.

Then as reviews turned to 2 stars in Amazon it changed to "We will take it in consideration" till the final "OK! We will add things and make changes to the ending. STOP GIVING US 2 IN AMAZON!"

Well, in fairness, after the scope became apparently they said "let's hold off on talking until more people have experienced the ending". Let's face it, if there hadn't been so much public discussion and mocking of the ending many people wouldn't have known they should be upset. People are sheep that way and some of the most vehement critics haven't actually bothered to play the game.

-Personally I don't think it will be 100s of man hours of work.

Easy money is we'll see some animated game graphic cutscenes showing the effects of the player's decisions.

Well, they need to find the coding tags for each of the various changes and decisions that might have an impact. There needs to be at least one scene for each major decision, and after three games there is a lot. Plus they need to take into account all the various options related to DLC, which packs each player has and every potential combination.
Think of every major galactic-affecting decision and then multiply that for three, so there's one for each ending.

And then dialogue needs to be written then checked and double checked by multiple people, as it's not something that can be handled by the new guy. Then everything has to be recorded by the professional voice actors that do not work for free. And there needs to be a director monitoring the voices.
Again, keep in mind there will have to be alternates. If Wrex or Tali or Garus died then there needs to be someone else saying the lines and acting in the scenes.

While that's going on they need to animate the figures and scenes. Of course, if they have a scene in a location not previously used there needs to be new backgrounds made (or updated from older games). If there are any new animations needed (poses or interactions with an object) those need to be programmed and scripted in.

Then all that needs to be compiled and united and programmed to work with the game without conflict yet be separate.
Oh, and that has to be done for PC, Xbox 360, and PS3. And it needs to be tested (repeatedly) to see if it works with every possible plot permutation.

Then it needs to be built into an installable program that can be sent and unpacked without incident. Again, to three different systems.

It is a heck of lot of work. And they can't charge a dime for it and the entire thing is coming out of their profits for the game, a game which is already being heavily criticized and might not sell well in the long term.

Then, after all that, many people still aren't going to be happy. They'll look at the new ending and say "well, they should have done this from the start" or "I still don't like the DLC" or "but I still didn't see Tali's face so I'll never buy BioWare again."

[Number Six]

It's not EA. EA has nothing to do with it. At all.
EA is just the owner publisher. They sign the cheques and collect the extra profits and are the boss' boss to the folk at BioWare, who are the people involved in the ending. They're really the only ones involved, and as long as they keep making money and following the guidelines handed down by EA (such as DLC and official sequels as they sell, which was the problem with DragonAge 2) then BioWare can manage themselves.

This seems like a naive viewpoint. EA has everything to do with it. BioWare is a label of EA. A unit. Part of the company. Just like 'EA Games' or 'EA Sports'. Only difference is they've allowed BioWare to retain their brand name. Both Zeschuk and Muzyka, the 'bosses' of BioWare, have been placed in executive VP positions within EA's corporate structure. They've been harvested. Or indoctrinated. Take your pick of Mass Effect references. To imply EA does nothing but sign the checks is absurd. They have their fingerprints all over this. They tell BioWare what to do and how to do it. I would bet dollars to donuts it was a mandate from the very top of the chain that demanded as open an ending as possible to ME3 so the door would be left wide open for more DLC and ultimately, more sequels and/or spin offs. (EA looooves to milk their franchises for all they're worth). When this turned into a PR nightmare for them, it was EA who gave BioWare the order to do the free DLC 'extended cut'.

It's a case of the genuine artists (the pre-acquisition staff at BW) being undermined by the EA spin doctors. Had BW still been their own masters, ME3 would have turned out a lot different: No bolted-on multiplayer, no bogus 'better with Kinnect' features (waste of time and resources), they wouldn't have been rushed to push the game out the door on a certain release date (thus no tacked-on non-ending), and let's be honest, the series would probably still be closer to its RPG roots instead of being a shooter with mild RPG elements thrown in. In some respects, the situation is similar to WotC being a subsidiary of Hasbro. There's a lot of creative people at Wizards, but from time to time, the parent company makes some boneheaded decisions for them because of 'corporate interest' or politics or whatever.

It's only the tiniest of canon derivations. It's something most people won't ever notice as it involves reading one of the Codex. And not even the primary codex with the speech, but the secondary written codex. And it's so easy to explain away the explosions not being that deadly through any amount of technobabble. It's no big deal, and is really splitting hairs to get more upset over the ending.

Honestly, I never noticed the codex entry before.

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What I remembered though was the MASSIVE explosion that wiped out the Batarian system in Arrival after the Mass Relay was nuked. Based on the precedent, I figure Shep blowing the crap out of all the Relays pretty much dooms most/any planets within those systems and makes him a bigger war criminal than any Reaper could hope to be in its wildest dreams. If it was explained away how this wouldn't happen somewhere in ME3, I must have missed it. I suppose the Space God Child could have just cast a 9th level wizard spell on the red, blue, or green explosions so those big shockwave ripples we see wouldn't hurt planets or... something.

[alhoon]

Honestly, I never noticed the codex entry before.

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What I remembered though was the MASSIVE explosion that wiped out the Batarian system in Arrival after the Mass Relay was nuked. Based on the precedent, I figure Shep blowing the crap out of all the Relays pretty much dooms most/any planets within those systems and makes him a bigger war criminal than any Reaper could hope to be in its wildest dreams. If it was explained away how this wouldn't happen somewhere in ME3, I must have missed it. I suppose the Space God Child could have just cast a 9th level wizard spell on the red, blue, or green explosions so those big shockwave ripples we see wouldn't hurt planets or... something.

Yes but that happened under considerably different circumstances. When I witnessed that in the ending I didn't even consider it was similar since it was different color.

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I.e. when I saw the explosing rings I said "Ooops, they deactivated them and destroyed the hull so they can't be recovered. WTF!" Yes, I wasn't pleased the MRelays were destroyed. Since it showed the surviving earth though, I didn't even considered it would be a similar release of energy as when you threw an asteroid to make it blow up, instead of ray making it explode.
The explosion shown was also different. Blue/Red/Green instead of SNova like.
As for the Normady crashing. I went when I saw that people considered it crashed in a "jungle planet" I mean, I was sure it was just "Southern Africa" on Earth. Why would people assume it was a "jungle planet"? I didn't go all this way to say earth to have normandy crash elsewhere! There is no indication whatsoever that this place is something different than good ol' earth.

[Jester of the FoS]

It's not EA. EA has nothing to do with it. At all.
EA is just the owner publisher. They sign the cheques and collect the extra profits and are the boss' boss to the folk at BioWare, who are the people involved in the ending. They're really the only ones involved, and as long as they keep making money and following the guidelines handed down by EA (such as DLC and official sequels as they sell, which was the problem with DragonAge 2) then BioWare can manage themselves.

This seems like a naive viewpoint. EA has everything to do with it. BioWare is a label of EA. A unit. Part of the company. Just like 'EA Games' or 'EA Sports'. Only difference is they've allowed BioWare to retain their brand name. Both Zeschuk and Muzyka, the 'bosses' of BioWare, have been placed in executive VP positions within EA's corporate structure. They've been harvested. Or indoctrinated. Take your pick of Mass Effect references. To imply EA does nothing but sign the checks is absurd. They have their fingerprints all over this. They tell BioWare what to do and how to do it. I would bet dollars to donuts it was a mandate from the very top of the chain that demanded as open an ending as possible to ME3 so the door would be left wide open for more DLC and ultimately, more sequels and/or spin offs. (EA looooves to milk their franchises for all they're worth). When this turned into a PR nightmare for them, it was EA who gave BioWare the order to do the free DLC 'extended cut'

BioWare is a subsidiary of EA, which means it's still a seperate entity:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subsidiary
It retains its management and staff, the owners are just another corporation and not an individual. Instead of reporting to stakeholders, they report to another company.

includes both Mythic Entertainment and BioWare. This newly formed team (now called the BioWare Group) will be led by Ray Muzyka, co-founder and General Manager of BioWare. With this change, Muzyka becomes Group General Manager of the new RPG/MMO studio group. BioWare's other co-founder, Greg Zeschuk, will become Group Creative Officer for the new RPG/MMO studio group. Rob Denton will step up as General Manager of Mythic and report to Muzyka, later becoming Group Operations Officer of the new Group. BioWare's studios remain unchanged and continue to report to Muzyka.

From:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BioWare
The head of BioWare is still its founder. While EA can make demands, there's only so much they can do. And as BioWare is the golden child its best for them to keep a light touch.

It's a case of the genuine artists (the pre-acquisition staff at BW) being undermined by the EA spin doctors. Had BW still been their own masters, ME3 would have turned out a lot different:

I doubt ths very much.

No bolted-on multiplayer,

Multiplayer has been long, loooong requested by ME fans.

no bogus 'better with Kinnect' features (waste of time and resources),

Okay, this is probably true.

they wouldn't have been rushed to push the game out the door on a certain release date (thus no tacked-on non-ending),

If they needed extra time they'd have cut smaller side missions. The ending would have been unchanged. As it was a cutscene, it was likely done early.

and let's be honest, the series would probably still be closer to its RPG roots instead of being a shooter with mild RPG elements thrown in.

All ME games have been shooters. This is just silly.

In some respects, the situation is similar to WotC being a subsidiary of Hasbro. There's a lot of creative people at Wizards, but from time to time, the parent company makes some boneheaded decisions for them because of 'corporate interest' or politics or whatever.

Yes and no. In both cases, the parent company has almost nothing to do with the subsidiary. WotC's problems have been influenced by Hasbro, but their mistakes are their own and have much, much more to do with the company's management style and the CEO not really being a gamer.

[Number Six]

BioWare is a subsidiary of EA, which means it's still a seperate entity:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subsidiary
It retains its management and staff, the owners are just another corporation and not an individual. Instead of reporting to stakeholders, they report to another company.

Not exactly true. BioWare is a division of EA. A dubious wikipedia article for you too: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Division_(business)
There is a difference though. Subsidiary implies EA is nothing more than a holding company. (Again, your cashing checks analogy). After BioWare was merged with Mythic, their studios became one of the EA 'labels' that puts out games for the company. As I said before, the only difference between EA Games or EA Play and BioWare is that EA allowed BioWare to keep their own brand name instead of tacking an 'EA' at the beginning or end. I would assume this is because BioWare has strong brand recognition within the game community/market.

I'm not implying that some dark robed EA overlord is standing over the shoulders of the BioWare staff every single day, but you can bet your sweet bippy every moderate to major decision is being forwarded to the bosses to be vetted.

Multiplayer has been long, loooong requested by ME fans.

Hahaha. No. No, no, a thousand times no. I NEVER ONCE heard a ME fan clamoring for a Gears of War-esque multiplayer mode. Because they didn't. You know what some of the fans did want? Co-op. Two (or three) players going through the story together. Nobody asked for the horde mode. Just go back and look at the feelings of unease among the vast majority of the fanbase when the multiplayer feature was first announced.

If they needed extra time they'd have cut smaller side missions. The ending would have been unchanged. As it was a cutscene, it was likely done early.

The cutscenes, maybe, but many specifics of the ending were changed at the last minute by Casey Hudson. We know that portions of it were rewritten at the 11th hour by Hudson and another unnamed writer. I have no proof EA meddled via Hudson or forced his hand here, but it's my suspicion they looked at the ending and asked for it to be changed in some manner. (Again, I feel they wanted the ending as vague as possible so they could continue with DLC/sequels). Why else would Hudson suddenly do an about-face and make what was a better explained ending (according to Mac Walters) vague and pretentious?

All ME games have been shooters. This is just silly.

Mass Effect 1 to Mass Effect 2. There's a big difference. And the EA logo is quite prominent on ME2, isn't it? Without the influence of EA, I think BioWare would have stuck with the gameplay of the original, which still wears its RPG roots on its sleeve.

[Jester of the FoS]

I'm not implying that some dark robed EA overlord is standing over the shoulders of the BioWare staff every single day, but you can bet your sweet bippy every moderate to major decision is being forwarded to the bosses to be vetted.

Not so much. With eight subsidiarity/ divisions, 14 publishing partners, and 24 studios there's likely very little day-to-day or even week-to-week being handled by the heads of EA. EA has also been heavily criticized for its meddling in the past, which has cost it money. They've been backing away from buying talent and ruining it for some time:
http://www.wired.com/gamelife/2008/02/riccitiello/

The fact of the matter is EA has grown too damn big to micromanage. Even if the partners are only making one game and the studios are sharing games, there's hundreds of games being made. Simply not enough time for one CEO or upper management to interfere. EA has it's own games to manage and own branches to handle, they can't also handle BioWare and Mythic and Popcap, and Maxis.
Plus, most of the original BioWare founders are still employed. If they were unhappy, stifled, or feeling unsatisfied they would have jumped ship with as many employees would have followed and set-up shop elsewhere.

Multiplayer has been long, loooong requested by ME fans.

Hahaha. No. No, no, a thousand times no. I NEVER ONCE heard a ME fan clamoring for a Gears of War-esque multiplayer mode. Because they didn't. You know what some of the fans did want? Co-op. Two (or three) players going through the story together. Nobody asked for the horde mode. Just go back and look at the feelings of unease among the vast majority of the fanbase when the multiplayer feature was first announced.

We know that portions of it were rewritten at the 11th hour by Hudson and another unnamed writer. I have no proof EA meddled via Hudson or forced his hand here, but it's my suspicion they looked at the ending and asked for it to be changed in some manner. (Again, I feel they wanted the ending as vague as possible so they could continue with DLC/sequels).

Source? Link?
I think they can make DLC and sequels without a vague ending. It's not hard as there's lots of room for prequels (First Contact War with the Turians) or side stories or even sequels set a century later.
And BioWare proved it was good with inventive sequels in DragonAge: Origins.

All ME games have been shooters. This is just silly.

Mass Effect 1 to Mass Effect 2. There's a big difference. And the EA logo is quite prominent on ME2, isn't it? Without the influence of EA, I think BioWare would have stuck with the gameplay of the original, which still wears its RPG roots on its sleeve.

ME1 was totally a cover shooter. I tried to play it as a normal shooter and got destroyed. The two big gameplay changes were the addition of ammo and simplification of the equipment management. Everything else seemed minor.

[Number Six]

Source? Link?

http://me3finalhours.com/ - plenty of insight into how rushed and harried things were right up until the deadline.

The specific Mac Walters quote I'm thinking of was...

"Originally, with the Catalyst, the Star Child at the end of the game, I had written that much more in the guise of a investigative style conversation, where there is something he tells you but then, you get to ask a bunch of questions and you get your questions answered. But then me and Casey talked and decided, let's keep the conversation high level, give you the details that you need to know, but don't get into the stuff that you don't need to know. Like 'How long have they been reaping?'. You don't need to know the answers to the Mass Effect universe, so we intentionally left those out."

In retrospect, leaving out some of those details may have been a mistake. Had they left it less vague, the need for an extended cut might not even be there.

And BioWare proved it was good with inventive sequels in DragonAge: Origins.

Wait, I'm confused. You mean... DA:O being an inventive semi-sequel to Baldur's Gate? Or are you referring to the DLC released for Origins like Awakening, et al? Because, yeah, I can see that. But if you're talking about DA2 being the inventive sequel... I reckon you're probably in the minority crowd. I know some people liked 2, but for me and a whole boat load of others it was 'dumbed down' and felt like a very rushed project. I'll refrain from wildly speculating about EA's involvement there, though...

[Jester of the FoS]

Spoilers

"Originally, with the Catalyst, the Star Child at the end of the game, I had written that much more in the guise of a investigative style conversation, where there is something he tells you but then, you get to ask a bunch of questions and you get your questions answered. But then me and Casey talked and decided, let's keep the conversation high level, give you the details that you need to know, but don't get into the stuff that you don't need to know. Like 'How long have they been reaping?'. You don't need to know the answers to the Mass Effect universe, so we intentionally left those out."

I dunno. A big long conversation there would have killed the flow and momentum of the exit up to that point. We didn't need a lengthy exposition at the very end. I was satisfied not knowing the full complicated backstory of the Catalyst. It was unnecessary.
Prior alien race made the Reapers to cull advanced organic life every 50k years or so or organic life would make synthetic life that would invariably wipe out all organic life. Gotcha. Details unnecessary.
It doesn't add anything and detracts from the pacing.